Sunday, August 14, 2011

From the vault: hipster love

When I wrote this, I had been spending a lot of time in L.A., the Ace Hotel in Palm Springs, New York City, and Portland.

At the time, it seemed like hipsters had taken over the world. I felt like I was swimming in a sea of plaid. Bicycle-riding, mustachioed, ironic tote bag-toting art school drop-outs (or honors graduates, more likely) swarmed from their all-white minimalist apartments in droves. And they wanted to MAKE THINGS and SELL THEM TO YOU ON ETSY.

These things would be made of felted wool, or else chunks of wood. They would have owls, whales, or mustaches on them. For these three were the totem symbols of Hipsterism. The sacred trinity of cool.

I think the hipsters are kind of busy making a living now. Some of them had kids and realized that onesies with screenprinted mustaches are just as gross when covered with spit-up as cheap regular ones. Some were successful with their restaurants/goat cheese-making/cupcake shop, and now they are yuppies.

This original post spawned a whole regular column about hipsters for a time, with varying degrees of success. And it was funny, until it wasn't anymore.

Sometimes people ask me to write hipster smack again, but I think that much like the pet rock their day has passed.

What do you think? Are the hipsters alive and well?

3 comments:

  1. i still like the hipster posts. call me lame, or unhip or what ever. mono

    ReplyDelete
  2. While I relate to your hipster commentary and yes to me it was funny as hell, I do understand your sentiment. Having a kid who is 18 and just told me she got a tatoo(GASP!!)and sending her off to school. I realized that yes there exists a slight generation gap....but it's ok. Do we understand it all, perhaps not, but so what, because overtime time itself becomes the great equalizer. Everybody has their trends...etc. But lemme tell you, you are such a talented writer and witty and funny so whatever you are doing, please keep doing it.

    ReplyDelete
  3. I am in stitches. And I second what Angela Lee said, "But lemme tell you, you are such a talented writer and witty and funny so whatever you are doing, please keep doing it."

    ReplyDelete

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